“The crowds were absolutely great, especially near the end as we crossed the river, and helped me to push on with their support.

“The Izaak Walton Shield that I won for coming first will have pride of place right on my mantelpiece. It has some very famous names on it and I’m very lucky to have it.

“I’m definitely going to run again next year. Let’s hope that it isn’t quite so muddy!”

Coming in at a close second and third were Dan Haworth and Stuart Bond respectively.

Participants in the Dash came in all shapes and sizes (Image: Alex Cantrill-Jones / ACJ Media)

First lady home and first girl under 18 was Elsbeth Grant, while the first over 18 female to finish was Vicky Wright.

Erwin Vroenhoven is part of the Dovedale Dash committee. He said: “I think it went really well. We had a bit of a difficult start with the bad weather as the mud and rain made it very hard to get cars onto the parking field, which caused big queues.

“This mean that we unfortunately had to start an hour later than we wanted.

“But the race itself was brilliant. We had 1,528 people finishing the race this year, which is around the same as we had last year.

“I think that people really enjoyed themselves. Once the race started they looked like they were having fun and some even came in fancy dress. Some looked like cartoon characters, some in Halloween masks, and there was even someone in a wedding dress.

“Today we employed a more professional timing system that meant that people weren’t waiting around getting cold after the race which is a bonus. The results of it can be seen on the website already.